First Time driving with drink

pauly04

Hi guys,you must all hate me.i hate myself.i am only 19 years of age.I Never drink and drive but on sunday just gone i decided to have a couple of pints in my local which is only 30 seconds away from me in my car.I decided against leaving my car in the car park as i was afraid of what will happen to it over night.I brought it home and bumped into the guards about 10 seconds away from my house.I was driving home to watch the superbowl with my friend.


They arrested me,i was so shocked as i have never been involved with police before.I was quite drunk,i was very stupid.I was put in a cell for a half an hour which scared the hell out of someone who has never been arrested before.Anyway, i was over the limit.I now have to attend court on valentines day.I face 2 years been banned from the road.Can anyone tell me what to do as im really scared.


It was my fault i know and you can give me as much abuse as you want.But it has affected me so much that i have not even drove my car since the incident.I really dont want to lose my licence i adore driving and am about to lose my job (not from drink driving).My next door neighbour is a well known guard and will help me.He is meeting up with my dad on thursday.But what will happen to me?


Please can i have honest answers as i have been affected badly with what has happend.I have not been talking to any of my friends and if their parents find out how stupid i was they will not be able to get in my car anymore,and that is the last thing i want as i am FAR from a drink driver its the first time ever.I was going to leave my car there but decided against it.Im sorry if you all hope i lose my licence but i really dont know what i will do if that happens.Please can someone give me advice .Im scared and that was the biggest Regret of my life.
Thank You.

Victor

Get a solicitor. I would be wary of using the Garda connection. Expect a one year ban.

Spearately, I suspect you could do with having someone to sit down to talk to.

murphaph

There's plenty worse things that can happen to a person than getting a driving ban. You could have a terminal disease or something like many poor unfortunate 19 year olds. Cold comfort I know but it's true. I'm not gonna have a go at you for what you did, that's for the court. It seems you are genuinely sorry. Make sure that comes across in court and as Victor said-get a good solicitor.

tk123

pauly04 wrote:

I am FAR from a drink driver its the first time ever.I was going to leave my car there but decided against it

It doesn't matter - you still did it so that makes you a drunk driver. The ban might actually cop you on - eh you could have KILLED somebody!?!? I sorry - i honestly didn't want to have a rant at you honestly - but this got me thinking of my friend sobbing telling me how much he misses his little brother who was killed by drunk driver - i'm sure that guy was in a fix too and decided to take the car and had no intention of causing any harm?! :mad: This guy was 21 years old when he was killed - the same age you'd be after a 2 year ban - which would you prefer?! If somebody you knew was killed and you found out they's still been allowed to drive after the first time they'd been caught driving over the limit because nothing happened how would you feel?

Zaph0d

Does anyone see a link between gardai displaying their influence by getting drink driving cases delisted and the prevalence of drink driving?

Archeron

Like a previous poster mentions, you are only 19, so if you get a ban, take it on the chin. At least you're young and will be back on the road soon enough. Most importantly though, is the fact that you KNOW what you've done is wrong, and it certainly sounds like you wont be doing it again. To be brutally honest, I drank and drove once as well, when I was 20. I didnt get caught by the guards, but the whole experience made me really scared as I did crash in my own front garden, and I have never done it since, and will never ever do it again. I know how lucky i was, and I know how unbelieveably stupid I was. I have great disdain for those who do it, but whats the point in ranting at you? If people are honest, I think almost every driver has done this at least once, and i think 99.9% got away with it, hence the reason so many still do it.
Just keep this experience with through your life and consider it a valuable lesson. I sincerely hope that you never drink drive again, but I also wish that the thousands of people who do this EVERY weekend would have a similar experience themselves, but as you know, people who do it regular never seem to be caught until they kill someone. I wouldnt use the friendly local neighbourhood guard either, you have to accept what the court throws at you like a man. (or woman). If you can stress in court how sorry you are as much as it comes across here, who knows, they may be lenient. Good luck with it.

Maskhadov

could be worse, you could have crashed and killed someone. Try dealing with that. Count your blessings the Gardai did catch you.

Pigeon Reaper

Maskhadov wrote:

could be worse, you could have crashed and killed someone. Try dealing with that. Count your blessings the Gardai did catch you.

I agree. Better the Gardai than anything else. You could have killed yourself or worse someone else. A mate of mine was killed in a crash with a drunk driver. The driver got two years for it and is now suicidal. You made a decision to drive with drink on you despite knowing the dangers to yourself and others, you should be glad it's just a one or two year ban with high insurance afterwards.

Everyone makes mistakes yours was a bit more serious than most peoples but learn from it.

Also buy a bicycle.

Metrobest

You're young and you made a mistake. It's not the end of the world: nobody was hurt. The best, and most mature, thing you could do is just take the punishment on the chin.

The Gaurd in the court saying "he's a nice fella, go easy on him" is not really to be welcomed. The bottom line is that drink driving is a menace to society, it ruins hundreds of lives each year, causes untold sufffering. You could use your experience to warm other people in your area about the dangers of drink driving.

On a side issue, the presence of large carparks in pubs obviously just makes the whole drink driving problem worse. A radical proposal might be as follows:
pubs which have X amount of car parking spaces would, by law, have to employ a car park security gaurd responsible for ensuring that people don't leave the car park in a drunken state. Anyone entering the car park would agree to being checked/tested when leaving it.

dts

There is no getting round it, you will get a ban.
If the local guard can help in any way then think your self lucky and take the help.
most people have done it at some point in there life so dont beat your self up too much. At least you wont loose your job over it and you dont have a family to support.

spockety

If a local Garda "helps" out then it's f****g disgraceful, and a sad indictment of the state of the law and it's application in this country.

You drove while drunk. You are a menace to society, despite what you say here. You do not have the capacity to make the correct decisions when it comes to road safety, as you have demonstrated. I hope you're kicked off the road for at least 2 years, perhaps in that time you can educate yourself on the dangers of drink driving. Hopefully you'll be spending enough time on buses to catch up on some reading.

D'Peoples Voice

Say your defence is that Transport 21 is taking too long,
you felt left down by the government,
and this drove you to drink!
Coming home you knew that waiting for a bus was not an option knowing how infrequent they are and so you had to drive:D

Or you can say you've repented for your crime!

Either way, I can't imagine our backward court system giving you anything too penal, they only go hard on old pensioners who haven't paid their TV or dog licence!

Bluetonic

spockety wrote:

If a local Garda "helps" out then it's f****g disgraceful, and a sad indictment of the state of the law and it's application in this country.

You drove while drunk. You are a menace to society, despite what you say here. You do not have the capacity to make the correct decisions when it comes to road safety, as you have demonstrated. I hope you're kicked off the road for at least 2 years, perhaps in that time you can educate yourself on the dangers of drink driving. Hopefully you'll be spending enough time on buses to catch up on some reading.

How did you offer advice to the OP by posting this utter rant, he asked for advice not for criticism thrown at him.

To the OP, get good legal representation, that would be my advice.

MrPudding

Metrobest wrote:

On a side issue, the presence of large carparks in pubs obviously just makes the whole drink driving problem worse. A radical proposal might be as follows:
pubs which have X amount of car parking spaces would, by law, have to employ a car park security gaurd responsible for ensuring that people don't leave the car park in a drunken state. Anyone entering the car park would agree to being checked/tested when leaving it.

This is something I find quite annoying. People in Ireland are always look for someone else to blame. If your proposal went ahead then we would have drink drivers using the defense "well he let me out of the car park."

People have to take responsbility for thoer own actions. I doubt there is anyone who drinks and drives that thinks what he is doing is not wrong. They know what they are doing and they take the risk, what little risk there is. They will continue to take the risk until it becomes apparent that the risk is too great.

Nannying people is not the solution, enforcement is the solution.

To the OP. Busted. I am not going to say you shouldn't have done it, you know that already. As others have said get a good solicitor and prepare to take your oil. It seems that you have already learned a lesson here, try to get that accross to the judge.

MrP

spockety

Bluetonic wrote:

How did you offer advice to the OP by posting this utter rant, he asked for advice not for criticism thrown at him.

The OP said, and I quote, "you can give me as much abuse as you want".

Bluetonic

spockety wrote:

The OP said, and I quote, "you can give me as much abuse as you want".

The phrase 'tongue in cheek' springs to mind.

dts

Hey Spockety, I am sure you have done something in your dim and distant past that you now regret (dont tell me you never drove above the speed limit?). Give the kid a chance.

Victor

On topic.

Metrobest

MrPudding wrote:

Nannying people is not the solution, enforcement is the solution.MrP

What does enforcment entail? Short of having a Garda patrol stationed at every boreen in the country, I don't see how such you could catch people? Even in Dublin city centre I've never seen drivers being breath tested.

Then you have large pubs in suburbia like The Goat which give their customers the most massive car parks, by default encouraging drink-driving. Let's not forget that publicans make huge profits. City centre pubs can afford to put bouncers on the doors. Suburban pubs with large car parks should be able to absorb the cost of a car park attendent whose job would be to make sure customers don't leave the place drunk - or at least not in their carsdrunk!

While the car park attendent would have no legal authority in a prosecution scenario, his/her very presence would deter drink drivers frightened of the police being called. This measure, replicated across all pubs with large car parks, would do a great deal to reduce drink driving levels.

By the way, I don't think drink driving is unique to Ireland. If anything, I think that Ireland has a more enlightened attitude than other countries. I've been shocked to see drunken Dutchmen stagger into their cars and zoom home after a heavy night's boozing. What saves them is a superior road network lessening the risk of collisions and, like in Ireland, a patchy police presence on the roads.

Agent Smith

1. You were caught.

BANG goes your chances of getting into america,

1. You were caught.

You now have a criminal Record

To the Op.

Drink Drivers are, IMHO among the Lowest of the Low in society. a Car is Like a Gun, and when you drink drive, you fire it, you never know who your going to hit,


Right, your repenting. Of course you are, you were caught, What if you were not caught? Would you have done it again?

Tbh your very lucky this state takes Drink Driving as a relitivly minor crime, (dispite what i think)

Heres a usefull link Here, Your going to need it.


Get a Good soliciter, Stand up in court, Be a Man and Admit you were wrong, Admit that It was A stupid Thing to Do. You're going to have to prove you can stand up to responsability. and before you think i'm an old sod ranting, i'm a year older then you.

be very gratefull that your not in front of me in court

Bam Bam

You only feel sorry for yourself because you were caught.

If you only live 30 seconds away why didn't you walk to the pub? It was becase you were lazy.

When you were drunk why didn't you walk home and leave the car. You say you were afraid it would be stolen. No, again you were both lazy and stupid.


You do desevre to be banned because it is stupid things like this incident that lead to people being killed on the roads


Also if that Garda neighbour of yours has any sense of duty he will stay out of it, as it doesn't concern him.

plonk

I drove 3 or 4 times when I was drunk but that was over year ago. Very stupid I know. I also used to speed a lot in the 100km zones probably doing about 120km a lot aswell. I got my car for free off my sister and didnt want it I didnt want the responsibility of having peoples lifes in my hands. On Irish roads its a very thin line between crashing into someone and not. But anyway after I got my full licence and ignition test I have stopped speeding and dui because they are the most stupidest things a person can do.

People are completely irresponsible on Irish roads and the roads themselves(being of such poor quality) have a big part to play. I would like to urgh whoever still speeds and dui to stop. It could be you?

steviec

You'll be driving again by the age most people are only thinking about their first car, it's not the end of the world by a long shot. It could have been much much worse so count yourself lucky and make sure you're never in that position again.